Across England, we estimate that since July 9th the daily number of diagnoses in hospitals is declining. PCR-positive infection prevalence is estimated to be similarly decreasing in all ONS regions and in all age groups.
Overall, since December 1st 2021, the Omicron variant has resulted in the cumulative number of infections increasing from 24.8 million individuals to 69.2 million. In total, 30% of all infections over the course of the entire pandemic are re-infections and this fraction is only expected to increase as currently we estimate 51% of new infections are first infections.
During the Omicron-era, December 2021-May 2022, we estimate a fall of around 75% in the IHR in the age groups over 45 and a decline of over 50% in the under 45 age groups. Since May, we estimate an increase in the IHR in the under-45s, though not back to pre-Omicron levels. There are small increases in the 45-64 and 65-74 age groups, whilst for the over-75s there is still evidence of an improving IHR. This phenomenon in the under-45s could, in part, be explained by a reduced protection from the vaccines against severe symptoms due to infection with BA.4 and BA.5. Additionally, the model does not yet include the second booster vaccinations that the over-75 age group have received, so any consequent improvement in health outcomes will be attributed to a drop in IHR. The overall IHR increases only modestly over this most recent period, from 0.7% to 0.8%. The over-75s still have the highest IHR at 3.3% (3.2%–3.4%).
Real-time tracking of an epidemic, as data accumulate over time, is an essential component of a public health response to a new outbreak. A team of statistical modellers at the MRC Biostatistics Unit (BSU), University of Cambridge, are working to provide regular now-casts and forecasts of COVID-19 infections and deaths. This information feeds directly to the SAGE sub-group, Scientific Pandemic Influenza sub-group on Modelling (SPI-M), and to regional Public Health England (PHE) teams.
We fit a transmission model (Birrell et al. 2020) to a number of data sources (see ‘Data Sources’), to reconstruct the number of new COVID-19 infections over time in different age groups and NHS regions, estimate a measure of ongoing transmission and predict the number of new COVID-19 deaths.
We use:
Data are stratified into eight age groups: <1, 1-4, 5-14, 15-24, 25-44, 45-64, 65-74, 75+, and the NHS England regions (North East and Yorkshire, North West, Midlands, East of England, London, South East, South West).
Value of \(R_t\), the average number of secondary infections due to a typical infection today.
The percentage of a given group that has been infected.
NB: negative growth rates are rates of decline. Values are daily changes.
| Region | Median | 95% CrI (lower) | 95% CrI (upper) |
|---|---|---|---|
| England | -0.04 | -0.06 | -0.03 |
| East of England | -0.06 | -0.11 | -0.03 |
| East Midlands | -0.05 | -0.09 | -0.01 |
| London | -0.07 | -0.10 | -0.03 |
| North East | -0.05 | -0.09 | -0.02 |
| North West | -0.03 | -0.06 | -0.01 |
| South East | -0.08 | -0.13 | -0.04 |
| South West | -0.06 | -0.09 | -0.03 |
| West Midlands | -0.07 | -0.11 | -0.03 |
| Yorkshire and The Humber | -0.03 | -0.07 | 0.00 |
Halving times in days, if a region shows growth than value will be NA.
| Region | Median | 95% CrI (lower) | 95% CrI (upper) |
|---|---|---|---|
| England | 15.07 | 11.74 | 22.26 |
| East of England | 11.18 | 6.23 | 25.33 |
| East Midlands | 14.62 | 7.33 | 73.79 |
| London | 9.77 | 6.32 | 19.83 |
| North East | 14.97 | 7.64 | 44.87 |
| North West | 20.43 | 11.28 | 122.57 |
| South East | 8.06 | 5.03 | 16.67 |
| South West | 11.96 | 7.56 | 22.23 |
| West Midlands | 9.82 | 5.87 | 21.19 |
| Yorkshire and The Humber | 23.17 | 10.21 | 150.37 |
Doubling times in days, if a region shows decline then the value will be NA.
| Region | Median | 95% CrI (lower) | 95% CrI (upper) |
|---|---|---|---|
| England | NA | NA | NA |
| East of England | NA | NA | NA |
| East Midlands | NA | NA | NA |
| London | NA | NA | NA |
| North East | NA | NA | NA |
| North West | NA | NA | NA |
| South East | NA | NA | NA |
| South West | NA | NA | NA |
| West Midlands | NA | NA | NA |
| Yorkshire and The Humber | NA | NA | NA |
NB: negative growth rates are rates of decline. Values are daily changes.
| Region | Median | 95% CrI (lower) | 95% CrI (upper) |
|---|---|---|---|
| England | -0.04 | -0.04 | -0.03 |
| East of England | -0.04 | -0.06 | -0.02 |
| East Midlands | -0.04 | -0.06 | -0.01 |
| London | -0.05 | -0.07 | -0.03 |
| North East | -0.04 | -0.06 | -0.01 |
| North West | -0.02 | -0.04 | 0.00 |
| South East | -0.06 | -0.08 | -0.04 |
| South West | -0.04 | -0.06 | -0.02 |
| West Midlands | -0.05 | -0.07 | -0.03 |
| Yorkshire and The Humber | -0.02 | -0.04 | 0.00 |
Halving times in days, if a region shows growth than value will be NA.
| Region | Median | 95% CrI (lower) | 95% CrI (upper) |
|---|---|---|---|
| England | 18.03 | 15.08 | 22.53 |
| East of England | 15.37 | 10.34 | 33.39 |
| East Midlands | 19.39 | 11.18 | 89.33 |
| London | 13.41 | 10.09 | 22.85 |
| North East | 19.19 | 11.66 | 59.98 |
| North West | 35.99 | 18.49 | NA |
| South East | 11.50 | 8.79 | 18.85 |
| South West | 15.87 | 11.33 | 29.04 |
| West Midlands | 13.56 | 9.80 | 24.89 |
| Yorkshire and The Humber | 34.56 | 15.49 | NA |
Doubling times in days, if a region shows decline then the value will be NA.
| Region | Median | 95% CrI (lower) | 95% CrI (upper) |
|---|---|---|---|
| England | NA | NA | NA |
| East of England | NA | NA | NA |
| East Midlands | NA | NA | NA |
| London | NA | NA | NA |
| North East | NA | NA | NA |
| North West | NA | 266.39 | NA |
| South East | NA | NA | NA |
| South West | NA | NA | NA |
| West Midlands | NA | NA | NA |
| Yorkshire and The Humber | NA | 269.21 | NA |
## The execution of the prevalence code block will proceed if
## prev.dat exists and this is TRUE
## it is not an external report and this is FALSE
The shaded areas show periods of national lockdown, the green lines the dates (once confirmed) of the steps in the roadmap in the UK Governement’s COVID-19 Response – Spring 2021, and the red line shows the date these results were produced (29 Jul).